Prong Collars

Hiking with Riley has reminded me how wonderful a prong or pinch collar can be. Most people would never consider a prong collar to be an option for our thin skinned greyhounds. However, if you have been hurt because your dog has pulled you off your feet.... if you do not enjoy walking your dog (even small dogs) because of the constant pulling or unexpected lunges.... if other animals are at risk because you are out of control, then a prong collar may just be your new best friend.


A prong collar basically gives you some leverage so you do not have to struggle and wrestle with your dog. I liken it to whispering. I would much prefer my dog to respond to gentle leash guidance than to feel like I am tugging, yanking, and manhandling my dog with a flat collar. Most dogs will "yip" the first time they lunge hard. They aren't expecting to feel the the pinch and are surprised by it. In cruel, insensitive hands a prong collar could do damage, but in gentle hands I have yet to see a dog pull so hard to cause injuries.



In my opinion, prong collars are not a substitute for good training. With few exceptions, I do not train with a prong collar. I aim to always be consistant so when my dog wears a flat collar, I do not allow any pulling and will issue a distance penalty each time. A distance penalty is backing up in the opposite direction and making the dog change direction. It can be tedious, but it pays off after a few weeks. When I do not have time to insist on good manners, a prong collar gives me a time out so we can just walk. Its very easy for a dog to tell the difference between a prong and a flat collar so there is no confusion.

A fitted prong collar should sit above the regular ID collar. A prong collar should not look like a necklace draped around the dog's neck. The collar is made up of links that can be added or subtracted to custom fit it to your dog's neck. I prefer the small sized links for greyhounds.

Hats

My local greyhound adoption group's calendar theme for 2009 is greyhounds and hats. I didn't want to send in a bunch of boring hat pictures so we "played" around with the idea. These were my favorites.

Reagan refuses to wear a hat. "Take that!" she says.

Reagan shows the hat who is boss!

Reagan says that Katie isn't the only greyhound who can fetch a hat.

An Asshat?

Katie likes to show off her talent for holding things in her mouth. "That'll be 3 salmon treats, Mom."

Riley enjoyed her new toy!

The First Time

Well, the name Wylie isn't working out very well. It does not roll off my tongue easily and most people think I am saying Riley when they hear it. So we are changing her name to Riley.

Riley enjoyed her first chicken back today. I usually wait for a weekend, so I can supervise how they are doing throughout the day.



Reagan got her first "ou-wee" doing agility today. She jumped from too far back and misjudged what she was doing. She crashed and fell into the metal standard. She was a trooper. She walked it off and got back to work.





I try to be very careful about how I react when the dogs crash and burn. Even if they are limping momentarily or have some scrapes, I just tell them how awesome that was and give them a bunch of treats. Agility usually isn't dangerous, but occasionally you will have a mishap. I have seen people react really dramatic and concerned. I think when your dog is thinking "Yikes, what just happened? Ouch, that hurt a little." And the human follows up with "OMIGOD, ARE YOU SERIOUSLY HURT!!! OH, MY POOR BABY!!!" that you start to validate that something really awful did happen. It can make the dog afraid of the obstacle and it can take a very long time to correct a bad experience. Reagan bounced right back and did great.



I am retraining some of the steps to the weave poles. Last time, I taught Travis and Katie to weave and then taught them how to enter the poles. If weaving wasn't hard enough, poles must be entered with the first pole on the dog's left, 2nd pole on the dog's right. Reagan was not catching on, so I have opened them back up to about 4 inches apart and have added mesh guides to funnel her in correctly. Now we are working from a variety of angles and she is doing great.


I am also trying to make training with Reagan's meals easier. Raw food is difficult to work with since it is messy and not healthy for humans. She also finds it difficult to think straight and has a hard time concentrating with chicken in sight. I am working with Reagan on easy exercises and teaching her that she must work with ME if she wants ME to give her a chicken back or neck. In the picture below left, she is staring at the chicken back. When she finally looks back at me and gives me eye contact for a few seconds (below right), I tell her "jackpot". "Jackpot" is the word I am using to tell Reagan she has earned a chicken back or neck.



















Riley still needs to learn to use those big ears. She can be lured with food into a sit and down. She is making good eye contact with me. She seems to catch on quickly that doing this or that earns treats, but I'm not sure that she realizes the clicker is marking what earns the treats. I am also teaching her name. Since she is not inclined to respond to it, I only say it when she is looking at me and I have a treat ready.



I am going to make a valid effort this weekend to introduce Riley to the house. Her house time as been very restricted because she is quick to put her feet up on counters and tables, she is a chewer, and she is very excitable and scrambles across the hardwood floors. Keep in mind that I have noticed all of this while she is on leash or supervised and gated in a small room. I cleaned the house and picked up the clutter, so I think it is ready to meet Riley. She is going to need a lot of supervising.

And Katie says this is the first time she has ever been asked to fetch a hat. She says "Whatever, just give me a treat for it."

Memorial

This memorial ad for Travis was placed in the October issue of Clean Run magazine. Clean Run is "the" agility magazine. I would like to thank my husband, Stephen, for hijacking my email address book and sending all the addresses to my sister, Denise. Denise emailed everyone asking for contributions and collected the money. She gathered all of the pictures and designed the layout. Denise, thank you for doing almost all of the work.

I was not suppose to find out about it just yet, but someone with the electronic version had seen it. I did not know this person personally, but she had seen Travis before. She took the time to visit my website and send me a nice note mentioning she had seen the ad. So I immediately went looking for it. To all the contributors, thank you. There are too many of you to count. I am thanking you all individually and currently working my way through the list. A few folks I did not even know. Needless to say, I was surprised and excited when I saw it. It is so beautiful.

Well, Travis has been gone 2 months as of today. I miss him so much, but the girls are keeping me busy. I noticed last night that Wylie's last race was on the day Travis passed away. Maybe it doesn't mean anything, but maybe it does. I think I will pretend that all was meant to be and everything is going as planned.

Its Official

We are going to adopt Wylie. She rested comfortably during the mock thunderstorm. Stacker didn't fair as well, but survived :-). Stephen tried to ease his fears with a treat for each crack of thunder which he appreciated.


If anyone wants a good storm CD, it is called Suburban Thunder. Its a very high quality recording of an hour long storm, so it sounds very natural as the storm approaches, is overhead, and then passes by. Some of the cracks of thunder make me jump a little.

I originally purchased it for Teresa (pictured left and below) who had a horrible storm phobia. Teresa was quick to associate anything with storms........ even summer afternoons. A particularly bad summer of storms, she went through a phase where she would have panic attacks every afternoon regardless of the weather. Another time, she was in the van when we drove through a thunderstorm. Suddenly the dog who loved to travel, meet new people, and visit new places hated to ride in the van and would have a panic attack in the van for several weeks after. We missed more than a few agility runs just because it was raining or cloudy.

Teresa's phobia was triggered by sound (same with Stacker). Although she started to create other (unreasonable) triggers, she never reacted prior to a storm unless she was already reacting to one of her make believe triggers. There were times when she would not notice an approaching storm because of a loud TV, but as soon as the storm was louder than the TV she would freak out. Eventually, she started to become suspicious when she noticed that I was turning the volumn up on radios or TVs. Or if I peeked through the window blinds. And if the power flickered or went out completely, you can just forget having a doggie-mental-meltdown-free-day regardless of the weather.

I was never able to desensitize her to the noise of storms (sometimes I do wonder if the low frequency booms are physically painful for some dogs), but the CD did seem to help warm her up for a bad storm and reduce her reaction to the actual storm. All in all, it was tiring and frustrating. Teresa was about as bad as it can get with the exception of dogs who will actually tear down doors or jump through windows to get away. I want to avoid it again if at all possible.


Stacker has a much milder case of storm phobia. Maybe we could reduce it if we worked at it.

Drum Roll Please.....

Thank you, Zan! Stephen and I both like "Wylie" for this wild and crazy girl. Thanks everyone for your suggestions. I knew that one would eventually get my attention.




Here is a rare calm moment outside of her crate.

Hound Obedience Trial

It took Youtube several days to process the Utility class video. Obviously it is too long.

Katie and I supported the hound only obedience trial last Friday. Katie competed in Wildcard Utility and Wildcard Open. The Wildcard classes do not count for anything and you can pick your jump height. We had a good time. I have decided that utility is just too hard to do when you don't practice very much. When we used to compete, Katie and I practiced just about everyday. But with all things considering, I think she did very well. We got first place out of one :-).

So here is the run down on the Utility Excercises:

1. Signals - Katie heeled beautifully as usual. I love heeling with Katie. She missed her down signal which was a problem in the past. There is just something vulnerable about standing alone on the far side of the ring and having to lie down. I had to verbally insist.

2. Scent articles - Katie is no dummy, so she thought it might be better to just head on out of the ring for her treats and skip all of this work. She did get the first article right. The 2nd one she just grabbed one randomly.

3. Directed retrieving - She retrieved the correct glove.

4. Moving stand - She did fine.

5. Directed jumping - I was actually impressed that she gave me any go outs at all. I figured she'd head for the gate instead, but she actually did head for the other side of the ring.

Open obedience is so much easier. I think in the future, we will stick to entering open. It doesn't require nearly the practice. Here is the run down:

1. Heeling - The judge screwed up our heeling pattern. So she had me restart somewhere in the middle. Figure 8's were fine.

2 - 4. Drop on recall, retrieve on the flat, and retrieve over the high jump was fine or good enough.

5. Broad jump - I chose to skip the broad jump.

In Open, dogs have to do a 3 minute sit stay and a 5 minute down stay with the handler out of view. I am always very proud of my greyhounds when they can maintain a 3 minute sit stay and even more so when I am not standing there. This is something we never practice anymore, but like a champ Katie held her sit stay while the basset hound failed by lying down.

All in all, we had a fun day reliving our glory days! :-)

What to Call the Beast

OK, so if I keep this brindle beast, I need a name. I still want to test her for storm phobia, but I need her to settle down a little. Its hard to judge her reaction when she's busy checking out the room and panting, so I'll wait till a little while longer. I also need to make sure she can handle work days. I have never had a healthy greyhound or guest that couldn't handle a 10-hour day, but it is always good to make sure before subjecting the dog to a lifetime of the long day schedule.









I like some of the suggestions I have heard so far, but none really seem to fit her. I'm hoping eventually one just jumps out at me, but if not, I will force one on her. Again, she is a wild tomboy. Horrible manners. She has pretty markings, but she's not really that pretty in any sort of feminine way. She sometimes makes snorting pig noises :-). 1 or 2 syllables is preferred. I have to admit that I did like the name Palin, but it sounds too much like Reagan and one political dog at a time is probably enough. Sarah sounds too sweet. I like the thought of a boy's name that is sometimes used as a girl's name. But I also like to be funny or descriptive if it fits. It does not have to be a typical human name. She is a trouble maker and full of mischief. Reagan is so petite and feminine.... Bob's Tilly is just the opposite. Bob's Tilly would drink beer and drive a truck.

More My Style

OK, this is more like it! This is Bob's Tilly and she is a pistol! I noticed her in the SEGA kennel earlier this week and she was quite interested in the goodies in my pocket.... very important. I had her doing sits within a couple of minutes and she appeared to have a good sit.... also important. Her size is also more in line with what I want. She might be a smidge shorter than Reagan, but she has more girth and meat to her.



I returned on Friday to take her on a field trip to PetsMart. PetsMart is such a great test for me. It provides a new and completely different environment with parking lot full of cars, automatic doors, shiny floors, strange looking dogs, chirping birds, and no other greyhound company for support. Bob's Tilly was very curious and brave. She checked out everything. One dog leaving the in-store vet clinic was very aggressive and vocal. He caused quite a commotion, but Bob's Tilly was unconcerned. She is a bull in a china shop and knocked stuff off the shelves of which none of it startled her. AND most importantly, she was able to eat treats. To me, if they can walk into a new situation, curious, happy, and hungry... I'm interested.

Next, I went to my agility field. I let her run around with a toy in a fenced yard. She ran and ran. She played with a toy for quite while. In fact, I finally decided that it was time to put the toy away. I love toy drive and energy. After all that, she still was extremely food motivated.



Today, I took her on a hike with Katie and Reagan. She dragged me the whole way. I am not a fan of being dragged, but I can appreciate her enthusiasm. I'm going to save my arm and use a prong collar next time. She plowed over logs and through creeks. She never tired or let up.

Other misc. qualities include quiet, travels fine, crates good, and has a hardy digestive tract. She was quiet in the van when I worked with Katie and Reagan. I really love quiet dogs as you know. She does not get car sick. My dogs spend half their lives in my van. Car sickness is not something I am willing to work on. She is an excellent crater. When I don't want to supervise her, she has not complained about being the only crated dog in the house. And sorry to be graphic, but they feed Science Diet dog food at the kennel. If that stuff comes out with any shape at all, I'm impressed. If she can digest Science Diet, she can probably digest anything.

Reagan is not impressed with our current guest and probably senses that mom likes her a lot. Katie is perfect, so she takes everything in stride. She is not jealous and she stays out of the way. So far I like what I see, but I will take a little more time before I decide.

Ugly Fellow

Now here is an ugly fellow with 1,612 babies on the ground. Its sad to say, but hopefully he was dropped on his head as a baby and his facial issues weren't genetic. If it was genetic, shame on all the breeders who used him as a stud dog. Racing greyhounds should at least have normal heads to pass food and air through. It doesn't matter how fast the dog is if he or she can't eat or breath. Heck, I even think they should be attractive.

Dreams

Happy Dreams!


















Its hard to sleep with a vibrating pillow.

Heart Dogs

Gosh, I love this dog so much! Travis was a diamond in the rough, but Katie has always been a gem. The thought of having neither of them seems completely unbearable to me. I think I would have a complete nervous breakdown if anything happens to Katie in the near future. I hate that she is 3 weeks older than Travis (both are/were 10 years old) and he is already gone. I just hope she can stick around for another 3, 4, 5 healthy years or so. Katie seems to embrace aging more so than Travis did. Travis avoided it completely. Nothing about him suggested he was 10 years old. But Katie's muzzle has changed from charcoal to light grey and white. Her eyes aren't as bright and clear as Travis' were. She has a slight gimp when she walks. While Travis appeared to be 5 years old, Katie looks like an 8 - 10 year old in great shape. Her fitness and energy level are high. Her muscle tone looks great. She has all of her (crooked) teeth firmly planted into healthy gums (thank goodness for raw food!). There is no reason to think she won't continue as she is for the next few years. But we all know how fast that can change also.

While Katie looks the part of a sweet, old lady, she certainly doesn't play the part. Katie doesn't behave like a senior. She still runs, jumps, plays, fetches toys, and practices obedience. Her gimp from the spinal stroke is noticeable, but it does not slow her down.


Maybe by the time she is 15 (because she is going to live at least that long), I will have another heart dog. Most people seem to refer to their heart dog as a once-in-a-lifetime dog. Well, I have already had 2 once-in-a-lifetime heart dogs. I would hope that over my lifetime there are numerous heart dogs. Especially as life goes on and things change, I hope there will be a wonderful heart dog by my side for the given situation and teaching me something new. I am terribly spoiled having had 2 amazing heart dogs for most of the last 7 years.

Maybe Reagan will be a heart dog. She has a long way to go before earning that label. I think my biggest fear is not having another dog I love as much as Katie and Travis. I love them all, but its not equal. Some work harder for it than others and it takes me awhile to fall in love, but I do want to fall in love with another heart dog whoever he or she may be.

White Flag

As requested, here are some size comparison pictures. The brindle, Stacker, is our tallest/biggest greyhound (29+ inches at the shoulder). He is about an inch taller than Robin, but you can see that Robin is a few inches longer. The photo will come up larger if you click on it. If I did not do agility or obedience I would probably prefer the bigger dogs. They are just so cool looking.

Reagan is our most petite. She is about 25 inches tall at the shoulder and weighs about 48 pounds.

Well, the Texas Bovine went back to Pam and Glen's yesterday. I hate to admit defeat, but he was just not doing well here. I am not sure what triggers him, but when we confine him to our dog room or to a crate, he frets and worries. Sometimes he is just fine and other times he is desperate and disruptive. I can't pin point it. He is never alone. The room is open and gated doorways provide plenty of visiability into other rooms. Most canine guests have no problem hanging out in the dog room with a twin bed mattress to sleep on. But Robin has what I can only describe as a panic attack. Like I said, not always, but probably half the time. Its not just a whimpering and complaining, its complete and utter frustration and desperation.... barking, howling, crying, and some sort of chirping noise. It is very disruptive and he simply did not fit into how we do things here. I just don't have it in me to work on the house problem for the next 3 weeks. Unfortunately, Robin has a history of this at the JCKC kennel as well. He was far from being a kennel favorite. Luckily, he did pretty well with Pam and Glen. He may end up staying there.

Lightly Used Toys

Katie would like to thank her friends, Dino and Pebbles, for sending her their lightly used toys. They had been played with so gently that most of them still squeaked......... at least they did until Katie and her sisters got a hold of them.

There are so many to choose from.

Katie shames her Rhodesian Ridgeback friends with her handy lion work. Ridgebacks were bred to hold lions at bay for hunters, but Katie shows that she isn't afraid to sink her teeth into one.

Lucky for the stuffies, there is slight safety in numbers. Instead of total dismemberment and disembowelment, most only suffered from minor amputations and punctures.

Texas Bovine

Holy Cow Dog! What is that? This is 3 year old, Greys Robin Hood from Jefferson County Kennel Club Track. He would be a fun one to name. I'd love to name him Bovine and call him Bo, but that goes against not wanting to rhyme with "No". Texas was another one because one of his white spots looks like a Texas Longhorn. The possibilities are endless.











No, I am NOT going to keep him. He is a high prey drive misfit somewhat like Travis, but he is far too large for me. He can just about carry me away. I haven't decided what is too big. While height can get in the way of of Agility, I think overall balance is most crucial. Unfortunately, this guy has a really long back. He barely fits in our 48" long crate. Some length gives the dog flexiblity, but too much makes it hard for them to collect and use their rearends to clear jumps, make tight turns, and adjust for tricky situations.











So Robin is here at our house for 1 month of boot camp. He leaves the first Saturday in October (Pam, make sure that is on your calendar :-). Hopefully, I can make some progress, expose him to the outside world, and do some obedience training. Sometimes I think on a dog like this, its best not to "fix" their bad habits too much before adoption. The right person who can manage his prey drive needs to adopt him. I think its best if that person does see the worst of it, so they do not get complacent and they know right off the bat what they are getting into. But maybe I can tone it down a little. I think his best bet is to head for a Texas adoption group. Someone would get a kick out of that longhorn on his back.

Credit Is Due

Katie has been retired for almost a year now. With no training goals, no shows, and no traumatic events (knock on wood!), there just isn't much to report on Katie. Its been said that Reagan has some serious paw prints to follow in, but almost everyone is referring to Travis when they say that. Recently someone said something to the tune of "even Katie will be tough to follow" and it got me thinking that she needed a little credit because Katie IS in fact a tough act to follow as well. She isn't as flashy or as soundly put together as Travis was, but she will always be the first agility champion greyhound. Unfortunately, she developed back problems that caused her to have issues with jumping and weaving and I retired her from agility soon after. If she had no physical problems, she would probably have several more MACHs by now. Travis was always little faster, but Katie was smooth, handy, and efficient and still holds a hard to beat record as the #2 greyhound in AKC agility.

Retiring from agility ended up not being such a bad thing. It switched our focus to obedience. Katie already had her novice and open obedience titles (CD and CDX), so we began training for the highest level of obedience, Utility Dog. It is the toughest thing I have ever trained. The dog has to do difficult exercises independently and often away from the handler. Katie is so much NOT like a hound. She is so good at letting me pick on the details and doing lots of repetitions. She is a work-a-holic due to her food addiction..... thank goodness she doesn't have the free will to feed herself :-). Katie finished her UD last May (luckily... before the spinal stroke).

Although Katie is retired from competition, she would probably die if I stopped working her. Plus its good for Reagan to have to share the attention. Katie and I mostly run through her obedience exercises and do some agility. The jumps are lower and we avoid the narrow plank obstacles (teeter and dog walk), but otherwise she takes her work as seriously as she always has.

Lastly, there is a hound only obedience trial in Atlanta on Friday, September 19th. They are offering non-regular classes, so I have entered Katie in the Wildcard Utility and Wildcard Open. The classes don't count for anything, but I'm allowed to pick the jump height. So now Katie and I have something to practice for. Competing in obedience (especially Utility) makes me so much more nervous than agility, so I like getting all of the ring experience I can get. It will be fun to get back in the ring with no pressure and to support the Hound Club of North Georgia.

Katie is just such a doll. She was quite the aloof hunter scanning the horizon as she would drag me along behind her when I adopted her over 7 years ago. When she realized I was the keeper of the food and toys, she looked at me and hasn't turned away since. Her focus is perfect. She is perfect. She has done everything I have ever asked of her. I could not ask for more. Thanks for letting me give props to my "Lil Pumpkin".